


Sin-Eaters

by Gruoch



Category: Daredevil (Comics), Marvel 616, Spider-Man (Comicverse)
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Missing Scene, Porn with Feelings, and those feelings are guilt/grief/redemption, canon nudged left, confessional introspection, if by established we mean showing up uninvited all the time, shamelessly ripping dialogue straight from the comics, superhero commiseration, the combined weight of Matt and Peter’s overwhelming guilt complexes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-05
Updated: 2021-02-05
Packaged: 2021-03-17 09:28:29
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,177
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29223222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gruoch/pseuds/Gruoch
Summary: Matt knew he’d come back. That’s the problem with men in masks...
Relationships: Matt Murdock/Peter Parker
Comments: 21
Kudos: 54





	Sin-Eaters

**Author's Note:**

> **TW** for very brief, non-graphic mention of suicide

_When I was a kid, God gave me a gift…_

_...He took my sight, but he gave me the world…_

_...every sound, every smell, every texture…_

_...He made me feel **everything…**_  
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“Your stitches are getting straighter,” Matt remarks, running the tips of his fingers over the line of thread woven through Peter’s thigh. “Still a mess, but straighter. Only took you how many years of practice to get here? A decade and a half?”

It’s late. Night and day superficially don’t appear any different to Matt. The hours blend together, an infinite mosaic of reds. But the city _feels_ different at night. The air cools. The noisy cacophony outside his apartment walls quiets just a bit. The rats come out in greedy, scurrying hordes.

Peter only shows up at his apartment at night, as well. _Breaks in_ , to be more accurate—looking for a safe place to get patched up after a rough patrol, or for sex, or sympathetic company, or somewhere to crash when the rent doesn’t come together. That all tends to blend together, too.

Not that Matt minds.

“Keep your dirty mitts off—you want me to die of sepsis?” Peter scolds, slapping Matt’s hand away. “And I’ll tell MJ you said that. She’ll be so proud of me.”

Matt snorts softly. “I doubt that.”

He grasps Peter’s leg, fitting his thumb into the crease behind his knee. 

“You and MJ are talking again?” he asks casually. 

He feels a tendon in the back of Peter’s knee tighten, hears the slight uptick in his heart rate and respiration. A stress response—the gash on Peter’s leg isn’t the only wound he’s licking tonight.

“You know how it goes. We’re always talking, until we’re not. Can’t blame her for getting tired of my bullshit. _I_ get tired of my bullshit,” Peter says with artificial breeziness. Matt can’t see the crooked smile that turns up the corners of his mouth, but he can hear it in Peter’s voice. “At least I know you’ll always listen to me. You don’t flinch from the gory details. It’s your job to keep people’s dark secrets.”

Matt snorts again. “What’s the difference between a lawyer and a priest?”

“You’re asking a Jew. Tell me.”

“You pay a lawyer to hear your confession.”

“I’m pretty sure I remember priests getting paid, too. I’m no Church historian but wasn’t that what that whole indulgences business was about?” Peter says, reclining back on Matt’s bed on his elbows. His tone turns playful. “You want a reward for your services, Red? Can’t we just be a couple of pals in spandex and Kevlar, shooting the shit, watching each other’s backs?”

Matt’s hand tightens on his knee. “You’re bleeding all over my sheets— _again._ I’ll have to buy a new set— _again._ ”

“Blot the stains with three-percent hydrogen peroxide and rinse with cold water before you throw ‘em in the wash. My aunt taught me that,” Peter says dismissively. Matt feels him lean over, hears the rustling of clothing.

“Tell me you’re not planning on going back out tonight,” Matt says, frowning. “You’ve lost at least a few pints of blood.”

“It is what it is. There’s a lotta crooks out there whose teeth still need rearranging,” Peter replies, sitting up and shaking his suit out of its crumpled ball. “Who’s gonna do their dental work, if not me?”

Matt takes hold of Peter’s other leg. “Me.”

Peter lets out a huff of air.

“You’d leave me alone here, in your bed, while you beat up my crooks?” he says, his tone turning sly and playful again. “Yeah, that’s not gonna work for me.”

There’s another rustle of cloth. Matt’s hands slide up Peter’s bare thighs, squeezing.

“You put the suit back on, I’m gonna—“ he threatens.

“You’re gonna what?” Peter shoots back, taunting. His pulse has quickened again, his body temperature risen. Matt can smell arousal on him, and he feels an answering heat build low in his belly.

“Well? What are you gonna do to me, Red?” Peter asks, low and husky.

Matt smirks. His hands slide higher, his thumbs slotting along Peter’s hip bones. He curls his fingers into the band of Peter’s briefs, tugging until Peter lifts his hips, and then sliding them down his legs.

“Ouchies,” Peter says as the fabric pulls across his messy stitches. “Be gentle with me, Mattie.”

“You can take it,” Matt says, rolling him onto his stomach. He runs a hand up Peter’s spine, feeling the bunched cords of muscle that lie along the ladder of his vertebrae, tense with anticipation. 

Matt leans over him, feeling the heat rising off Peter’s bare skin. He drags a hand through Peter’s sweaty hair, curling his fingers into a tight fist. He pulls Peter’s head back, pressing their mouths together. Peter’s tongue darts aggressively against Matt’s, a coppery lashing.

Matt releases him, sitting back once more. His hand retraces its path back down Peter’s back, slowly, fingertips weaving through and around the notches and bumps of his spine, down, down, down, until he’s lightly palming the firm round swell of Peter’s ass.

“Hurry up, Red,” Peter says impatiently. “I’m a busy man. People to see, faces to punch. I’m gonna swing on outta here if you don’t move it along.”

“If you put that suit on…” Matt says, a low growl in the pit of his chest.

“Oh, I’m so scared, tough guy, you got me shaking in my—“

Matt lifts his hand and brings it down again, a sharp, hard blow with the flat of his palm against the curve of Peter’s ass. 

Peter lets out a shocked squeal, arching up. He twists his head around to glare at Matt over his shoulder. “Fuck you, dude. That hurt.”

Matt grins at him. “You can take it. And I thought you could sense it coming?”

“You distracted me,” Peter says, petulant. “And it doesn’t work with people I trusted.”

“That’s sweet, you trust me.”

“I said _trusted_ —past tense.”

Matt smiles again. He smooths his hand over Peter’s heated flesh, imagining the red imprint left there, the blood that’s risen just under the skin to leave it hot and rosy. He leans over and Peter flinches under his hand, once bitten and twice shy, but Matt just presses a kiss to the mark, featherlight and soothing. And then, just to be an asshole and because he wants to, he sinks his teeth in, hard enough to bruise.

“God _damn_ you, Murdock, you mean motherfucker,” Peter spits out, grinding his face into the mattress and twisting the sheets in his clenched fists. “I told you to be nice.”

Matt lifts his head, grinning again with lupine malice as he strips out of his clothes and then stretches out the length of the bed next to Peter. But his hands are gentle as he rolls Peter over so they lie side-by-side, Peter’s back pressed flush to Matt’s front, spooning like lovers.

“Sorry,” Matt murmurs, pressing a contrite kiss to the soft spot under Peter’s ear. Peter’s hair smells like blood and sweat and cheap shampoo. Matt can hear the rapid thrumming rush of blood through the arteries in Peter’s neck, a bright pulsing blossom of red like the winking of a distant star, or the flutter and flash of some exotic bird’s wings.

“I’ll make it up to you,” he promises, sliding one arm under Peter and folding it around his throat, a kind of gentle headlock. His other hand drifts down Peter’s side, the tips of his fingers trailing over Peter’s flank and following the indent of his hip to the hot hard arousal curving up towards his navel. Matt wraps a firm hand around him, stroking him from root to tip and back again.

Peter releases a shuddering breath, reaching up to grasp the arm around his throat. Matt buries his nose into the damp curls at the nape of Peter’s neck, his hand keeping pace with the rapid drumbeat of Peter’s heart. His own dick juts against the cleft of Peter’s ass and he rocks his hips, chasing the friction and leaving sticky smears of pre-cum all over the base of Peter’s spine.

“You’re killing me,” Peter says, breath hitching, his fingers leaving bruises on Matt’s arms.

“You can take it,” Matt murmurs in his ear, his teeth against the lobe. He can taste the salt of Peter’s sweat, smell the blood under the thin skin of Peter’s throat, hear the wet sound of his own fist’s steady, relentless pumping, skin against skin.

It isn’t fancy but it is efficient. Peter’s pulse quickens. Muscles tense. Respiration turns uneven, shallow. Then—

“God, Matt,” Peter says hoarsely, bucking against Matt’s fist before spilling hot and wet all over it, the salty chlorinated scent of semen mingling now with the metallic tang of blood.

It’s the sound he makes that sends Matt hurtling over the edge after him—a sharp, almost pained sound, like Matt’s pulled something barbed out of the pit of his stomach. Matt makes a low, guttural sound of his own as he paints Peter’s lower back with a pearly constellation.

For a moment they lie there, tangled up and panting, their sweat cooling on their skin as their heart rate returns to normal. 

Matt finally lifts his head. He wipes his hand clean on the bloodstained sheet, before using the corner of it to mop up the sticky mess he’d made all over Peter’s back.

Peter rolls over when he’s done, face up, and Matt can almost picture the look of blissed-out satisfaction there, even though he’s never seen Peter’s face.

“God...I think I love you, Mattie,” Peter mumbles, throwing an arm across his eyes.

It’s the kind of thing he’ll only say under the cover of darkness, or behind his mask, but Matt doesn’t mind. Night or day, masked or unmasked, it doesn’t make a difference to him.

He lies back down next to Peter, nose pressed to his temple, smelling blood and salt.

 _God loves you, Matthew._  
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God has abandoned him.

_Daredevil killed a man…_

 _... **I** killed a man…_

 _I tried to convince myself I didn’t, but I hear the sound of his head hitting the cement wall every time I close my eyes... so I... I’m trying to do the job... for as long as I can, until…_

This is where it all ends.

*  
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“You’re done.”

It’s late. It’s always late. Too late. Matt’s hands are shaking. He can’t remember how he got home. His apartment smells like blood. His blood. Frank’s blood. Leo Carraro’s blood. An olfactory memory tattooed inside Matt’s mind right next to the sound of Carraro’s skull cracking against the cement wall, reverberating like the endless tolling of a bell.

A death knell.

“You hear me, Red?” Peter asks, sealing the edge of the bandage he’s wrapped around Matt’s cracked collarbone and shoulder with surgical tape. There’s no playful taunting in his voice tonight, no innuendo, no teasing. He’s as somber as a man at a funeral.

Daredevil’s funeral. 

“I hear everything,” Matt replies numbly. 

Carraro’s skull had sounded like a hard plastic shell filled with wet paper bags when it had hit the concrete, like the crack of a gun, like—

Peter touches him under the jaw, soft, but Matt feels it like an uppercut. 

He grabs Peter’s wrist.

“I didn’t mean to kill him,” Matt tells him, squeezing his arm. “I didn’t...I messed up. I made a mistake.”

“I know,” Peter says, so very gently. “We all make mistakes. But you can’t go out again—not as Daredevil. You’re a mess, Mattie...you’re gonna get yourself killed. I can’t let you do that to yourself. It’s over. You’re done.”

Matt’s breath stutters. “Is that my punishment?” _Is there any penance great enough to absolve me of this sin?_

“I’m not punishing you, Red. I’m doing you a favor—as someone who cares about you, as your friend. We all know there’s gonna be a day when we can’t do this anymore. You get old, you get tired and hurt...you make more mistakes. You lose more people than you save. The math doesn’t add up anymore, and that’s when you gotta throw in the towel. Today’s that day for you, pal,” Peter says, patient but final. “Fisk wants blood and the cops will give it to him. The city’s a pile of dry tinder, and you’re the match. You gotta stop, or you’re gonna ruin it for the rest of us. I’m putting the word out...if anybody sees you in costume, I’ll find out.”

 _And what will you do to me?_ Matt wonders, but he’s too afraid of the answer to ask.

“You’re right,” he says instead, his voice hoarse. “I know you’re right...I can’t do this anymore.”

 _I’ve become the thing I despised most...the thing I most feared…_

 _Murderer._

Matt leans over and bows his head like a supplicant, elbows on his knees, before reaching for his cowl. He pulls it off, feeling cool air meet his bruised face. He swallows the tightness seizing up his throat before pressing the cowl into Peter’s hands.

Peter stands holding it silently for a moment. Matt can hear the sound of his gloved thumbs stroking over the molded leather. Then he’s abruptly dropping to his knees in front of Matt. He wraps a hand around the back of Matt’s neck, pressing their foreheads together.

“You can still do good, Matt,” he murmurs, almost pleadingly. “You just gotta do it as yourself. No mask. Give me your word, right now…you won’t put the suit back on... _promise_ me…”

“I promise,” Matt replies, his voice a bare-boned whisper, dry leaves over concrete.

Peter stretches up and kisses him suddenly, a ferocious clash of teeth and iron. And then he releases him just as quickly, getting to his feet and slipping away as quietly as he had arrived.

Matt folds his hands over his battered face. His palms smell like blood and sweat and gunpowder and tears.

 _God loves you, Matthew. Hold on to that and do the right thing. Renounce this violence._

 _ **Cast out the devil.**_

***

 _Daredevil is dead. Long live Matt Murdock._

***

He keeps his promise. Daredevil dies with Leo Carraro. Matt puts aside the violence that buried him.

It’s just that the violence won’t let Matt Murdock go. It’s waiting around every corner, coiled like a snake ready to strike. One thing leads to another, the circumstances shift too rapidly, lives are in danger…his city is in danger, the city he loves even when it doesn’t love him back.

Daredevil is gone, and now the true devils come out to play. And Matt Murdock can’t sit idly by while they burn his neighborhood to the ground. Fisk, the Owl, the Stromwyns, the skulking hordes of criminals and cabals of dirty cops, picking off the city’s weak and vulnerable like a pack of hyenas. Daredevil is gone, but these corrupt wolves keep crossing Matt’s path, like God wills it. 

God gave him these gifts.

 _You can still do good, Matt._

He tries. God help him, he tries. It doesn’t feel good enough. He makes more mistakes. He’s afraid of losing control again.

It’s late. Or early. The hours all blend together for him. He doesn’t sleep much anymore, haunted by the sound of Carraro’s skull slamming against concrete. 

It must still be night, though, because Matt hears a familiar heartbeat outside his apartment on the fire escape, one that only shows up under the cover of darkness. One he’s expecting. The window slides open, and feet pad across the floor to where Matt sits alone in the dark of his living room.

“You smell like blood,” Matt says, breaking the quiet. _You always smell like blood._

Blood and salt.

“Not mine, this time.” 

A hand grabs Matt by the chin, a hand Matt knows can bend steel like playdough. It’s gentle now, angling his bruised, bloodied face towards the window to capture the light filtering in from the sleepless city outside.

“Matthew Murdock...you’ve been a very, _very_ bad boy,” Peter says, tsking. 

The corner of Matt’s mouth twists up into a crooked grin. He grabs Peter by the hips. “I can make it up to you.”

“ _Shut up,_ ” Peter says harshly, fingers digging into Matt’s jaw. “This isn’t a game. I told you not to go out. You gave me your word.”

Matt jerks his head back, letting him go. “And I kept it. Daredevil didn’t go out. Matt Murdock did.”

Peter makes a sharp, impatient noise. Matt can feel the anger radiating off him in hot, red waves. “Don’t _lawyer_ me, Murdock.”

“I had no choice. Foggy was in trouble, he would have been killed if I hadn’t—“

“ _Why_ was Foggy in trouble, Matt?” Peter cuts in. “Because _you_ put him there. Someone could have died. _You_ could have died. Look at you—you got the shit kicked outta you. If Elektra hadn’t shown up—“

“At least she showed up when innocent people were in danger. Where were you?” Matt bites back.

Peter exhales sharply through nose. Matt can hear his fists clench.

“I’m here now,” he says.

“Too late,” Matt retorts.

Peter’s jaw always makes a clicking sound when he grinds his teeth together. A dental defect, or an old injury that healed wrong, Matt thinks.

“I had an encounter with your police detective today, the one trying to put your sorry ass behind bars for the rest of your miserable life. Detective Cole North,” Peter tells him abruptly. “And it wasn’t to catch up over coffee and donuts.”

Matt blinks rapidly, frowning. “What?”

“Yeah. I told you this was bigger than just you, Murdock. Looks like if the cops can’t bring Daredevil in, they’ll happily nab whatever other masked vigilante they can get their hands on. It was a sting op—North faked a mugging. Not very nice. I don’t like people pointing guns at me— _especially_ cops. Shit can get dicey real fast. Fortunately, it didn’t go that way. I generously forgave everyone involved, and then I took Detective North on a little field trip so we could have a lovely little private tete-a-tete.”

“You kidnapped a cop,” Matt says flatly. “I don’t see how that helps the situation.”

“ _Kidnapped?_ ” Peter repeats with exaggerated indignation. “I didn’t kidnap anyone. There were no kids present. I _man_ -napped a cop, _after_ he pointed a gun at me.”

Matt scoffs. “Always the jokes with you.”

“It’s how I deal with trauma, Red, you know that. And I was _very_ traumatized. They tried to catch me with a net, like an animal. I felt very disrespected.”

“So you decided to kidnap a cop and throw gasoline on the fire,” Matt says, a knife-edge to his voice. “For a genius, you’re very stupid.”

“I did it because I don’t want to see you rot in prison,” Peter replies, just as sharply. “You don’t deserve that.”

“I _killed_ a man,” Matt says, his voice breaking. 

“You messed up,” Peter replies firmly. “We all make mistakes, and then we fix them.”

Matt drags a hand down his face, his head hanging low and loose on his neck. He feels like he’s aged a hundred years overnight. 

“You think you’re gonna fix this for me? What did you do? Did you threaten him?” he asks heavily.

“Not at all. I told you—we had a very pleasant heart-to-heart,” Peter replies. “I merely reminded him that Daredevil is a hero, and of the oath we’ve all taken—cops and vigilantes alike—to keep this city safe. A little food for thought.”

Matt lets out a humorless huff of laughter. “And did he seem… _receptive?_ ”

“He seemed pissed, but I’m gonna let him sleep on it,” Peter replies, turning away. “I gotta go. Don’t let me catch you out again.”

Matt’s hand darts out, grabbing his arm. “Stay.”

Peter hesitates. “Mattie…”

“Please. I can’t sleep. I keep...I hear him dying, over and over…” Matt murmurs. “Just give me something else to think about for a little while...”

“Mattie,” Peter says again, a note of grief in his voice now. He turns back, setting the cowl aside on the coffee table. He takes Matt’s head in his hands, tilting it back, running his fingers through Matt’s coppery hair.

“You need a haircut,” he murmurs. “And a shave.”

Matt presses his own hand against one of Peter’s, turning his head to kiss the heel of Peter’s palm. “I need you.”

*

“What are you thinking about now?” Peter asks, his lips against Matt’s ear, later on when they’ve moved into the bedroom.

 _Carraro’s head hitting the cement wall._

“I’m thinking about this time I ran into you, years ago, when you were just this skinny college student,” Matt replies, running his hands up and down Peter’s bare thighs, spread across the tops of his own, their hips pressed flushed together. Peter’s fist encircles both of their erections, lazily tugging.

“Yeah? Was I in a dumpster? Or were you?”

Matt grins, kissing the corner of Peter’s mouth. “You were getting ready to break into the Oscorp Building. It was full of armed security guards, and you were going to take them all on, all by yourself.”

“And you thought, damn, look at this scrappy little punk. Wish I had balls half as big as this kid.”

Matt laughs softly, pressing his forehead to Peter’s collarbone.

“No,” he says, his breath hitching as Peter twists his wrist at the top of his stroke. “No...I thought, this stupid little fucker in cheap spandex is gonna get himself killed. I wanted to take you home to your mother.”

He spits on his fingers, runs the hand down Peter’s damp back.

“Jokes on you,” Peter says, his grip tightening as Matt traces a spit-wet finger along the cleft of his ass. “My ma’s dead.”

“Jokes on me,” Matt agrees, rocking his hips into the tight tunnel of Peter’s fist. “You wouldn’t have gone either way. You threatened to break my arms if I tried to stop you. Little shit.”

“I was an angry kid. Give me a break.”

“You’re still angry.”

“Yeah, well, there’s a lot to be mad about. Like the stupid shit you pulled today—Jesus, Mattie,” Peter says, his breathing suddenly going strained as Matt breaches him with a single finger. “You bastard...I’m still not forgiving you.”

“I know,” Matt says, mouthing at his jaw. _I’m not asking for your forgiveness._

He wraps his own fist around Peter’s, setting a faster pace, heat pooling in his groin, tightening like coil. 

Peter pants raggedly against the side of his neck, breath hot and damp against Matt’s skin while Matt takes him apart on two fronts. He finishes first with a soft, strangled sound, coating their fists in hot slick cum. Matt follows a heartbeat later, shaking all over from the intensity of it.

Peter tips bonelessly out of Matt’s lap, sprawling out on the bed.

“Anyway...it’s a good thing you showed up that night at Oscorp,” he mumbles. “I woulda got my ass beat. Those goons weren’t scared of some little loudmouth jackass in a red-and-blue onesie. But they were scared of you, Hornhead.”

“Mm,” Matt agrees, lying down next to him.

“You’re brooding again, Red. What are you thinking about now?” Peter asks drowsily.

Matt stares sightlessly into the muted empty reds overhead.

 _That they don’t fear me. They don’t fear Matt Murdock..._

 _They only fear the devil._

***

 _When I was a kid, God gave me a gift…_

 _...He took my sight, but he gave me the world…_

 _...I dressed as the devil and used these gifts like a blunt instrument…_

 _...and people got hurt. People **died**. And it felt like God had abandoned me…_

 _...but He was always there. He knew that I just needed to be **better.** That yes, violence is a last resort…_

 _...but when there’s no other option...when good people are getting hurt...sometimes all you can do is…_

 _ **...lift your fists and fight.**_

Hell’s Kitchen is on fire. The devil won’t let it burn.  
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Matt limps into his kitchen. He’s sweating under his cowl, the muscles in his legs cramping. The white t-shirt he wears sticks wetly to his skin between his shoulder blades. His body is tired and sore, but his mind is clear and calm for the first time in months. He’s always known what he needed to do, and now, finally, he’s done it.

 _I’m turning myself in to the authorities…_

Matt opens the cabinet over the sink. He starts to reach for a glass but pauses, head cocked. He’s not alone—he listens to the sound of a familiar heartbeat approaching, a familiar scent.

Blood and salt.

Matt closes the cabinet door and turns around. He knew he’d come back. That’s the problem with men in masks…

...they’re unwavering. Committed. They’ll do the right thing, even if it feels like gutting yourself with a dull knife.

 _Of all the things you’re about to lose, this will be the most painful._

“You put the mask back on. I told you,” Peter says, his voice shaking with cold fury, “if you put it on again, I’d be back. I’m taking you in, Murdock.”

“Spider-Man. You’re too late—again,” Matt says, stripping his shirt off over his cowl. He unfastens his belt and zipper, shucking his pants off.

“What...what are you doing?” Peter asks. His pulse has picked up—he’s confused but he’s scared, too. It makes Matt want to cry, but he can’t yield. Won’t yield. Not even for Peter.

“The right thing,” Matt says, entering the combination into the locker where he keeps his Daredevil gear. He opens the door, reaching for the suit.

“ _Stop,_ ” Peter demands. “I told you that you can still help, just not as Daredevil--Matt, you’re gonna ruin it for everyone. You’re gonna ruin it for _us._ Why are you--don’t make me do this, _please._ ”

It takes every ounce of willpower Matt has to ignore his pleading. He puts his gear on piece by piece, slow and deliberate. “I’ve already surrendered to the police. I’m turning myself in.”

There’s a long silence, filled only by the rapid thrum of Peter’s pulse. 

“Mattie...you _promised_ me,” Peter says finally, sounding completely heartbroken.

 _Don’t waver. This is the right thing._

“Hell’s Kitchen was on fire. The Owl is dead, and his men neutralized. But the Stromwyns are moving in. They’ll buy everything up, turn out the families who live there...I can’t let that happen.”

Peter lets out an incredulous laugh. “You’re gonna throw your life away for a dispute with a real estate developer?”

“I’m protecting innocent families who would be left homeless,” Matt replies, wrapping red tape around his fists.

“Matt--”

“I’m turning myself in,” Matt repeats firmly. “But I’m Daredevil. And you’re not my moral authority.”

He turns towards Peter, raising his fists in a fighter’s stance. “Now get out the fuck out of my home before I call the cops.”

Peter laughs again, humorless. “You can’t be serious…”

“You broke in. You entered. That makes you a criminal,” Matt says, deadly somber. 

He can sense Peter’s muscles tightening, his pulse quickening, breathing steady. His own fists clench, readying himself, in case...just in case… _please, God…please, God..._

 _Come on, you bastard…do the smart thing. Do the--_

“If you’re lying to me, Red…I’ll be back” Peter says, taking a step back before vaulting up through the open skylight overhead.

Matt immediately sags against the locker behind him, weak and shaky all over, his breath leaving his lungs in a whoosh. If it had come down to a fight…if he’d had to fight...

God gave him these gifts, but he’s still only human. Peter is something more, and Matt’s not sure he has any fight left in himself. Not for this. Not with Peter.

His phone buzzes in his bag.

 _”Foggy Nelson,”_ the electronic voice assistant announces.

Matt pushes himself away from the locker. 

_Time to finish this._

***

 _If this is it…_

 _...if this is how it all ends…_

 _...then it ends on **my** terms. As God intended._

 _As myself._

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 _It’s all over. My nights of wondering when Leo Carraro’s death would catch up to me...it’s over. I’m going to face justice._

Matt’s phone buzzes in his pocket as he soars across the rooftops of the city, free—for now. His court date has been set, the clock is ticking down. 

_”Foggy Nelson,”_ the electronic voice assistant announces again, like Matt knew it would. Foggy’s called him three times in the past hour and left three very irritated voicemails expressing their urgent need to finish strategizing before Matt’s due in front of the judge.

Matt ignores this call, as well. Foggy is doing so much to fight on his behalf, God love him...he deserves better. But time is short, and if these are Matt’s last hours as a free man, then he needs to use them right. He needs to make sure his neighborhood will be safe. 

He needs to make amends.

Matt comes to a stop on the edge of a rooftop, where he waits. He knows he’ll come, sooner or later. He waits until—

A heartbeat. Blood and salt.

“Okay, now you’re _deliberately_ trying to piss me off and ruin my night, huh, Red?”

“Spider-Man,” Matt greets calmly. “I did exactly as I promised. I turned myself in. I’m going to face justice for my part in the death of Leo Carraro. They’re going to let me stand trial as Daredevil, and keep my identity safe.”

“I know. I watch the news. They haven’t been kind to you, Red,” Peter says.

Matt turns around to face him. “I’m not looking for kindness.”

“What are you looking for?”

“Help,” Matt replies.

There’s a beat of silence. Then he hears Peter drop down to the roof.

“I’m listening,” Peter says cautiously.

Time is short. Matt gets straight to the point. “I talked to Tony Stark today. I told him to buy Hell’s Kitchen out from under the Stromwyns’ boots, and then to sell it back to the residents for next to nothing.”

“You told Tony Stark to buy a whole _neighborhood_ and then immediately sell it at a huge loss, just so some other, meaner billionaires can’t have it?” Peter asks, sounding impressed. “Did he agree to it?”

“He’s going to sleep on it. But I think he’ll do the right thing. He’s a hero at his core, like the rest of us.”

“Damn, Mattie...are you trying to get me back in your bed? You know bullying billionaires is my biggest turn-on. I’m ready to drop to my knees on this roof right now. Take me, Hornhead. I’m yours.”

Matt smiles, relaxing as the tension is broken. “I have a better offer...I know where there’s gonna be a meeting tonight that includes a number of greedy billionaires among its unsavory guest list, including Fisk...I don’t want them thinking that just because Daredevil is in prison they’re free to trample on my city. What do you say to coming along with me and putting the fear of the devil in them?”

“One last ride for Team Red, and I get to scare the pants off a bunch of rich, corrupt pricks?” Peter muses. He cracks his knuckles. “That’s an offer I can’t refuse. Yeah, I’m game.”

Matt’s smile curls wider. “Good.”

***

 _It’s been a while...time to put the fear of the devil into some people._

 _I see now that the point of everything I’ve been through…_

 _...is that this is **me**. This is who God wants me to be._

 _ **I’m Daredevil.**_

*  
*  
*  
*  
*  
“Do you think that’ll work? I tried really hard to look dark and menacing in there,” Peter says, crawling down the side of a water tank.

Matt cracks a smile. “Yeah. Sure. It’ll help, I think. Anything to keep them looking over their shoulders, and seeing you rip a three-ton vault door off its hinges will definitely spook some of them.”

“Oh, good,” Peter says, dropping down onto the roof beside Matt. “Feels really satisfying for me, too. Good way to work out some anger.”

Matt turns towards him, head cocked. “At me?”

Peter lets out an exaggerated sigh. “I can’t ever stay mad at you, Red. You’re so damn charming, with all your Catholic guilt and dark brooding and shitty righteous stubbornness.”

“I _am_ still surprised you reached out to me, however,” he adds. “You got a lotta superpowered friends, and we haven’t exactly been on the same page lately.”

“I know,” Matt says. “Just...Foggy’s put together a strong team, and the judge seems sympathetic. But there’s a good chance I’ll be put away for some years, and…”

He trails off, his throat suddenly gone tight. 

Peter closes the distance between them. He cups Matt’s scruffy face in his hands.

“Mattie…” he murmurs gently.

Matt swallows a couple of times, clearing his throat.

“You’re a good man, Peter,” he manages to say. “I didn’t want to leave you without putting things right between us.”

“You’re a good man, too, Matthew Murdock,” Peter says. “Don’t ever forget it.”

Matt gives him a tight smile, reaching up to press a hand against Peter’s. He leans into the touch.

“Come home with me,” he says. “One last time…”

“Okay,” Peter agrees softly. “But it won’t be the last time. I promise.”

*

 _God loves you, Matthew…_  
*  
*  
*  
*  
*  
“What would your last meal be?”

“Morbid. Take the suit off,” Matt says, shucking off his own clothing.

“Mine would be my aunt’s cherry pie,” Peter says, obediently stripping in Matt’s dark bedroom. “God, I love that pie. I’d die for that pie. I’d _kill_ for that pie, and then I’d have it for my final meal while on death row for the murder I committed for it. Also—can we get some lights on in here? Some of us aren’t blind. I wanna look at you while you fuck my brains out, you sexy ginger son of a bitch. I gotta put that image in the mental spank bank to keep me going till you get outta the slammer.”

Matt smiles into Peter’s mouth as he kisses him. “You’re doing it again.”

“What?”

“ _Talking._ ”

“And what are you gonna do about it, huh?” Peter taunts, palming Matt through the front of his briefs. “You gonna shut me up?”

Matt doesn’t take the bait, this time. He gently pushes Peter back onto the bed, following him down, kissing his mouth again, his eyelids, his cheeks.

“Beautiful boy,” he murmurs.

“Mattie, you sap,” Peter says, running his fingers through Matt’s hair. “You don’t even know what I look like. I could have the ugliest mug in the city.”

“Doesn’t matter. I love your face...I love the way you feel...the sound of your heart beating...the way you taste,” Matt says, kissing him again, slipping his tongue into Peter’s mouth. He presses his face into the side of Peter’s neck, inhaling deeply. “The way you _smell.”_

He lifts his head, cradling Peter’s face between his hands. “I love you.”

“...Mattie…”

“It’s okay,” Matt says, kissing a line down the center of Peter’s torso, his fingertips trailing down the ridges of his ribs. He grasps Peter’s hips, taking the hot hard length of him in his mouth.

“Matt...” Peter gasps out, his fingers tangling in Matt’s hair. “Jesus, Red.”

Matt hums around him. He takes him deeper, swallowing. Peter mewls, his hips twitching in Matt’s grasp. Matt bobs his head slowly, reaching with one hand to tug down the band of his briefs enough to free his own erection. He wraps the hand around it, stroking himself in rhythm with the steady bobbing of his head, building up that aching heat.

“If you keep going, I’m gonna…” Peter finally chokes out, after Matt’s teased him for some time.

Matt pulls off, giving one last parting kiss to the salty tip. He gets to his feet, kicking his briefs off the rest of the way before going to the bedside table. He fishes a condom and a bottle of lube out of the drawer, then turns on the lamp.

“Yeah, finally, that’s better. Look at you, you big handsome bastard,” Peter says appreciatively, the sheets rustling as he turns over on his stomach. “God, it’s gonna be a tragedy when you gotta wear an orange jumpsuit...it’ll clash with your hair.”

Matt snorts, smiling.

“You’re a dick, you know that?” he says, nudging Peter’s legs apart with his knees as he crawls back into bed. He settles in the space between, folding one of Peter’s legs up and out of the way, running a hand over the curve of his ass while he pops open the cap on the lube with his other.

“If you spank me again, I’m gonna break all your fingers,” Peter threatens. “I’m not into that shit.”

Matt smirks, slicking up his fingers. “I can tell when you’re lying, you know. Your pulse gets faster. You start to sweat. Your breathing quickens.”

“Creepy, dude,” Peter says, his voice muffled as he buries his face in the pillow while Matt starts patiently working him open.

“Says the man with the spider-themed alter-ego,” Matt replies dryly, twisting his fingers and making Peter gasp.

“Come on, come on, come on,” Peter says, pushing his hips back against Matt’s fingers. “Enough already, I can take it. Let’s go.”

Matt pulls his fingers free, wiping them on the sheet before fumbling to open the condom packet, his hands clumsy with urgency. 

Peter rolls over and sits up, taking it from him and tearing it open.

“You’re as wet as a girl, Murdock. You’re really looking forward to this, huh, buddy,” Peter murmurs, gripping Matt’s aching dick and giving it a firm stroke, smearing a gob of precum down the length of it before rolling the condom on. He gives Matt’s balls a playful squeeze when he’s done, just this side of painful, dragging a grunt out of Matt.

“Little shit,” Matt growls, like a term of endearment, pushing him down onto his back.

Peter’s legs clamp around Matt’s waist, viselike. He shoves a hand down between their bodies to grab Matt’s dick again, lining him up, impatiently digging his heels into the backs of Matt’s thighs.

“Come on,” he urges again, lifting his head up to mash his mouth against Matt’s, their teeth knocking together. 

Matt decides to drag it out a little longer instead, as payback. He ignores Peter’s demands, dropping his head to suck a mark into the bright red pulse point in the side of Peter’s neck.

“You’re killing me, Murdock,” Peter complains breathlessly.

“You always say that, but you haven’t died yet,” Matt replies with a grin. But he gives in, if only because he can’t wait another second himself.

Peter makes a gut-punched noise as Matt buries himself deep in a single slow thrust. He actually shuts up for a time after that, the room quiet save for the sounds of their ragged panting and the wet slap of their bodies meeting, slow at first and then building in speed and force.

“God, I love you, Matt,” Peter finally pants out.

Matt grins, nosing along Peter’s throat while he grinds his hips into him. “Yeah? If you had to choose...me, or your aunt’s cherry pie?” 

“Oh, no, that’s not...that’s some _Sophie’s Choice_ shit, I don’t—You. The pie. Both. Everything. _Fuck!_ ” Peter bites out, grabbing Matt’s arms tight enough to bruise as he shakes apart.

“You made a mess out of my sheets again,” Matt says a little later, when he’s caught his breath.

“You’ll live,” Peter mumbles, still recovering. “They’ll give you a clean set in prison.”

Matt lets out a breathless laugh. He rolls onto his side, grasping Peter’s skinny face in his hand and leaning over to press a sloppy kiss to Peter’s temple.

“Asshole,” he murmurs affectionately.

“I’m sorry,” Peter murmurs back.

“It’s alright,” Matt says, tracing a finger down Peter’s crooked nose and across the seam of his lips. “I know humor is how you cope with trauma.”

“No, I don’t mean all the prison jokes. Those were _very_ funny. I stand by them,” Peter says, sniffing. “I mean...I’m sorry about the way I’ve treated you, Matt. I was mad, but not at you, and…”

He goes quiet. Matt leans over and kisses him again, finding his mouth this time. Peter’s breathing is unsteady, stilted, like he’s on the edge of tears.

“I want to tell you something…” he says finally.

“As your lawyer or your priest?” Matt asks.

Peter lets out a soft huff of air. “As my _friend_ , shithead.”

Matt runs the pad of his thumb back and forth across Peter’s lips. “Just your friend?”

“My...dickwarmer?”

Matt snorts, rubbing their noses together. “How about as...your lover?”

He feels Peter’s lips turn up into a lopsided smile under his fingers.

“Okay. Okay, Mattie, you old softie,” Peter agrees. “As my _lover._ ”

Matt smiles back at him. “I’m listening.”

Peter swallows audibly. His pulse has quickened again. Anxious.

“Her name was Charlemagne,” Peter tells him quietly. “Charlie.”

“Who?”

“The woman I killed.”

Matt goes still. “Peter…”

“I’ve never told anybody this,” Peter says. “It was an accident—I messed up, like you did with Carraro. A wild punch. Wolverine was involved—he was friends with her. We were in Berlin, trying to track her down. She was wanted for murder, and...I was in over my head. Me and Logan got in a fight. It was... _brutal._ Logan went completely berserk, and I was hitting him so _hard._ I was scared he was gonna hurt somebody—hurt Charlie, hurt _me,_ and I just wanted to put him down fast, you know? He could take it. I knew he could take it, but…”

“Peter…” Matt says again, his voice thick with grief and dread.

“She came up behind me,” Peter says in a flat, low voice. “I thought it was him, and I….what really kills me is she did it on _purpose_. She wanted to die, and I...it was _horrible_. I can still picture her face. What was left of it...nothing but— _red._ I didn’t know what to do...I just...I wanted to come home. I was mad at myself for not turning myself in, for pretending like nothing had happened. And then all this shit happened with you, and when I looked at you, all I could see was myself, and it made me so—so _mad,_ and I...I just..”

Matt grabs Peter’s shoulder, tugging him over to lie on his chest. He tucks Peter’s head under his chin, wrapping him up in a tight embrace.

Peter takes a shuddering breath. “Will you be okay, Mattie? I just need to know you’ll be okay.”

“I’ll be fine,” Matt promises, and he means it this time.

 _God’s given me the best people. I know my path now._

 _Whatever happens, I’ll be okay…_

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I live for comments. You can also find me on tumblr as [groo-ock](https://groo-ock.tumblr.com)


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